As a special Mother’s Day treat, three of National Geographic WILD’s veterinarian moms got together for an hour of tea and conversation about their careers, motherhood, and new episodes of their series. The season finale of Dr. Oakley: Yukon Vet debuts May 16th at 8/7c, while new seasons of Heartland Docs, DVM and Dr. K’s Exotic Animal ER begin May 30th and June 7th respectively. It was a lively and fun bonding moment for these three incredible women.
The animal kingdom is full of extraordinary animals that raise their young in inspirational ways. “The first one that jumps to my mind to be honest is seahorses, because the males are the one that carry the young and actually look physically pregnant,” Dr. Michelle Oakley joked. “But the ones that inspired me recently are the macropods. I was just over in Australia helping with some of the bush fire rescue and it was incredible how many joeys, young kangaroos, that came in that weren’t burned at all and they were really too big to be in the pouch. They came in okay and the mom was totally burned and had to be put down. So it was like basically the mom was letting these big joeys in the pouch, sometimes she would have another one in the pouch and they would survive but the mom wouldn’t. So that was pretty touching and when you actually see them, too, the mom’s that did survive, we’d have them bandaged and they still would be wanting to groom the babies. They’d have their head in the pouch trying to groom the babies, so it was really something to see.”
“I was a huge fan of the mama kangaroo,” Dr. Susan Kelleher, aka Dr. K., added while talking about how she balanced motherhood and becoming a vet. “I was a big fan of the sling, I still have it. My babies have slept in cradles in my office that my dad made, they have slept in desk drawers covered by tie dyed blankets. I have been breastfeeding a three-month-old while reading a chapter about how to put a cardiac pacemaker in a ferret and the cardiologist came and thank God he had three kids and could understand why that needed to be done that way in a manner of multitasking. It’s about balance. I have a little rock and I can’t find it right now that has the word balance on it and at work I have to keep it in my pocket.”
“We have all these mama cows out here and it just amazes me because we have so many different weather things,” Dr. Erin Schroeder shared. “We had the flood last year and these mothers, just like the kangaroo moms that will sacrifice themselves for their babies, they just take care and they raise their babies out in the elements. I feel like if I leave my kids outside for a half-hour and tell them to go out and play they can’t take care of themselves and they’re old enough. But these calves and little foals, the mares and the cows just take care of their babies and they keep them alive. And if you ever want to really test that theory just try and touch a calf out in the pasture. You better have your running shoes on. I just think that’s pretty incredible and there’s thousands and thousands of times that plays out every day out here.”
“My grandma was kind of like the save all the alley cats, save every animal, so I know I got that from her,” Dr. Oakley said about the inspiration behind her animal rescue profession. “My mom was always strong about putting yourself in another person’s shoes… but it is a really good trait and I find it helps me a lot with understanding where a lot of my clients are coming through and even having that empathy why animals are acting a certain way. I really thank my mom for that and I thank her out loud for it a lot because it is a good thing to think through, even though someone is getting you so mad.”
“My mom did a lot of things that made me a little crazy when I was growing up,” Dr. Schroeder added. “She canned and she gardened and we hung clothes out on the line, so she was really sort of eco conscious before it was cool to be eco conscious, so she taught me that. But she’s really feisty and she probably has a titch of OCD which has really compelled me to do what I do. So I think probably the best compliment I can give her is that every morning I’m like ‘I’m turning into my mom,’ like I’m becoming my mother. And hopefully my kids will say that someday, too. Now that I’m older, I appreciate all of the things that were maybe lost on me when I was younger.”
Dr. Oakley gave birth to two of her three daughters while she was in veterinary school and started her own business when the kids were very young. “It wasn’t exactly a super normal childhood for them at times when they were being dragged around from farm to farm,” she shared during the chat. “But it’s all tradeoffs and the good side is they were getting out at different farms, they were getting out at different wildlife facilities, they were learning the business. We were having a lot of chats in the car, we were doing a lot of driving time together. It’s kind of developed into where they’re still working in the family business and I think out of my three daughters I may have no vets but I definitely have three really tough, hard working young women that have a lot of empathy for people and for animals. I don’t think I would do it differently, I don’t regret it but there’s always these trade offs. Really it was from me just kind of making the changes so that they could be with me and that was really for the survival of our business early on.”
How do these extraordinary women plan to spend Mother’s Day? “When I was out gardening today I told my husband and my kids that I needed a new four-pronged hoe,” Dr. K shared about her passion for gardening. “I’m hoping that comes through. What I’d like is to be able to have a cup of coffee… and then do some gardening and fart around with that, do some work on a lime tree my husband said I couldn’t save, and then… a shower involving soap instead of just rinsing my body in the pool would be helpful because I work on Monday and Tuesday.” Dr. Schroeder agreed that wanting some of life’s simple pleasures is a hard goal for a working mom. “How I want to spend it is now how I’m going to. I want breakfast in bed and a big bouquet of flowers. That is like never going to happen in my house.”
The season finale of Dr. Oakley, Yukon Vet showcases some of her time in Australia mentioned in this article. Viewers can watch it on Nat Geo WILD on May 16th at 8:00 ET/7:00 CT.
The season premiere of Heartland Docs, DVM starts May 30th at 8:00 ET/7:00 CT and Dr. K’s Exotic Animal ER begins June 7th at 9:00 ET/8:00 CT.